Hendrix, Dylan, Rolling Stones,finite holes in platterscircumvolving light yearson the spindle-trickle of remorse.A thousand songs intensifiedand played a million timesto many eggs on many leaves.

At night they multiply, swarmthrough the keyhole of your cell,from the cracks in sweating walls.They glut your memories, leaveanswers to forgotten questions.You hear them in the whineof complex circuits on the linesthat galvanize the scourge of greed.They scuttle through your mind,invade your sense of reason,steal time, broken watches, bombs.

You were there at the crossingwhen the song of rails announcedthe thunderous entry of passing souls.Their statues draped in vines would crumble.Through marble holes and cracksin barren bones, the scarabs come.

If you get high enough,you'll find a way to worship down.

Plaything

It is bloodless,clean and graywith no insides.

I find itlying mauledbeside the cat,who thinksit is a toy.

I take it for dead,until it twitchesits tail,and turns itswhiskers upward,in a sad smile.

I put it in a bag,take it outsideto a back lot.

I find a placeto set it freewhere itcan hideamong the weeds.

It protests,bites my fingers,follows me home.

Later I findit sleepingon the bednext to the cat,whiskers upwardin a sad satisfied smile.

He ignores her as she enters his studioto settle herself in the wicker chair.She spreads her skirts to complementthe innocuous piece of furniture.

With a few strokes he transformsher seat into an anthropomorphic idol,exponentially dissembling her formin an explosion of convoluted outrage.Simultaneous brushstrokes converge,spin into a vortex of movement at the center.Yet in the foci are her eyes, her question.

Is this thing we do so wrong?

Slowly she rises, unbuttoning her blouse.She removes the brushes from his hands,presses his palms firmly to her breasts.

When she grows old& minutes between wordsbecome too hard to bear,he finds a place for her.

She textures the hourswith patterns from within,weaves a curtain out of time& hangs it in her eyes.

She knows the momenthe dies, the how & why,as she does the rhythmsof tree rings, sand & fog,

the way a man thinkswhen there is nothing leftbut the gun in his hand,cool and black enough